Product returns: How digital shelf analytics can cut the cost

Online retail has made returns easier than ever. Your customers often purchase multiple sizes or styles with the intention of returning what they don’t want. However, product returns analytics reveals that many of these costly returns can be prevented when you improve your product data management and digital shelf monitoring.

Product returns aren’t just a B2C problem. If you’re a manufacturer in any industry (from industrial equipment to electronics), you’re likely feeling the squeeze of product return costs as B2B buying becomes increasingly consumerized. Digital shelf analytics for product returns gives you the visibility and control you need to address this growing challenge before it impacts your bottom line.

Why product returns are an issue

According to consumer research, the common reasons for returning products include: 

• The item didn’t match the product description  
• Incorrect fit/style
• The customer disliked the product  
• The item was damaged/defective
• The customer never intended to keep the item in the first place 

These issues point to a critical gap: the disconnect between what your customers expect based on your product listings and what they actually receive. Product returns analytics identifies these gaps across your digital shelf, helping you understand which product attributes cause returns and where your listing data may be incomplete or inaccurate.

Returns mean higher logistics and resource costs for you, as well as greater product waste. This causes a significant hit to your brand’s sustainability commitments, both through emissions and waste as unwanted products often find their way to landfill. Product returns also dent your brand loyalty, particularly if your products come back because they don’t match their online listings.

If you’re selling across multiple marketplaces and retailers, tracking these issues manually is nearly impossible. This is where digital shelf analytics for product returns becomes essential. It provides automated monitoring across all your channels to catch errors before they result in costly returns.

How digital shelf analytics for product returns delivers results

Many product returns stem from poor customer experiences on the digital shelf. Using digital shelf analytics for product returns, brands can identify and fix issues like incorrect product information, deleted images, or missing product relationships before customers make purchasing decisions. Product returns analytics transforms reactive returns management into proactive prevention by monitoring the accuracy and completeness of your product data across every channel.

Digital shelf analytics software gives brands insight into three key aspects of their digital shelf operations: buyer behavior, product performance, and channel competition. This type of insight is invaluable if you’re selling online. From avoiding stock-outs or missing product listing content to seeing how you compare to your competitors, digital shelf analytics is a must-have software tool for any forward-thinking e-commerce strategy.

When applied specifically to reducing returns, product returns analytics focuses on monitoring the factors most likely to cause customer dissatisfaction: data accuracy, content completeness, competitive positioning, and customer feedback. By tracking these elements in real-time, brands can intervene before poor listings lead to purchases (and subsequent returns).

Plus, when it comes to helping reduce product returns, there are key advantages of having digital shelf analytics. 

Ensure accurate product information  

Your products could be misrepresented by something as simple as a single missing letter or digit. This might sound like a small issue, but it can have significant implications for your customers. For example, a misplaced decimal point when buying a steel girder can leave your customers with an unusable product. If that girder is part of a larger construction project, it could mean substantial delays and mounting costs.

Why is this information inaccurate in the first place? Unfortunately, the nature of the digital shelf means these things happen. Decimal points can slip. Numbers or words can disappear entirely. That’s why you need eyes and ears across all your channels, to tell you what’s wrong, and what you need to do to fix it.

Creating and syndicating product content is only part of the equation. Digital shelf analytics software ensures your product information stays accurate and consistent across all your channels so you can avoid returns piling up.  

Maintain brand consistency  

Product information is your number one sales tool on the digital shelf. However, that doesn’t mean your branding should take a back seat. Whether you’re trying to attract new customers or keep existing ones, ensuring your brand is consistent across all your online sales channels is essential to winning on the digital shelf.

Brand inconsistency directly impacts return rates. When product packaging, logos, or visual presentation differs from what customers see online, it creates doubt about product authenticity and quality. Product returns analytics tracks these brand elements across your digital shelf, alerting you when unauthorized changes occur. This is especially critical for brands selling through third-party marketplaces where you have less direct control over how products are presented.

DSA software can boost the value of your brand as much as it does your products. If your brand identity (such as logos, information, and visuals) has been altered on any channel, your DSA software will alert you so you can fix it.

Keep an eye on prices 

If you are selling your products through multiple digital shelf channels and marketplaces, the prices of your products sold via these resellers may have fluctuated without you knowing. Price consistency can be a huge factor in how consumers perceive products.

Price inconsistency creates two problems: it erodes trust before purchase, and it triggers buyer’s remorse after purchase when customers discover they overpaid. Product returns analytics monitors pricing across all your sales channels, enabling you to spot and correct price discrepancies that could lead to returns driven by post-purchase price comparisons.

DSA software can automatically analyze prices across your omnichannel digital shelf, helping you stay completely up-to-date on pricing. That way, once you become aware of any price increases or decreases, you can react accordingly. Since managing these updates by hand can be time-consuming and subject to costly human errors, many brands, manufacturers, and retailers rely on product information management software as their single source of truth. PIM software with built-in DSA capabilities can help you make changes effectively, efficiently, and accurately.  

Leverage the power of product reviews 

Reviews are often a crucial part of the buying process for consumers. From product listing page reviews to dedicated websites that rank and compare brands and products, reviews have great weight on the digital shelf. Indeed, people are more likely to buy a product that has customer reviews than one that has none.

Product returns analytics includes review monitoring as a critical component of returns prevention. By analyzing review sentiment and identifying common complaints (such as sizing issues, quality concerns, or misleading descriptions), you can update product listings to set more accurate expectations.

For example, if reviews consistently mention that a product “runs small,” you can add sizing guidance to the product description, reducing returns from customers who order the wrong size.

Better analytics. Better decisions.  

No matter what you’re selling online or where there is one thing that’s key to your success on the digital shelf: data. Ensuring you have insightful, actionable data on your products is the first step to improving your omnichannel strategy and reducing your product returns.  

Digital shelf analytics is the software solution that can transform your online sales and help you tap into a range of benefits that stretch far beyond reducing product returns. Our comprehensive guide to digital shelf analytics has everything you need to know about DSA and the benefits of PIM with built-in digital shelf analytics.